Dunstone and Homan win men’s and women’s finals at PointsBet Invitational

By Canadian Press on October 5, 2025.

CALGARY — Rachel Homan’s domination on the Canadian women’s curling scene continued on Sunday afternoon.

One day shy of the one-year anniversary of the last time she lost to a Canadian opponent, Homan capped off a perfect week at the PointsBet Invitational with a 6-2 victory over Corryn Brown of Kamloops, B.C., at Calgary’s WinSport Event Centre.

“They were playing great all week. We watched them on TV and they were making everything. So we knew we were gonna have to bring our ‘A’ game today,” said Homan. “It looked they were gonna get a big end there, but we were able to capitalize on a couple mistakes and get a lead.”

Trailing 1-0, Brown had a chance to take the lead in the fourth end when her tap attempt for two was heavy and wide, resulting in a steal of one. Brown had another shot at a multi-point end in the fifth, but missed a double with her final rock to surrender another point and fall behind 3-0.

Against the “Homan Empire” as they’re known, digging yourself an early deficit is a death sentence.

Homan’s Ottawa-based team of third Tracy Fleury, second Emma Miskew, and lead Sarah Wilkies last tasted defeated at the hands of another Canadian rink on Oct. 6, 2024, when they fell 5-4 to Kerri Einarson in the final of the HearingLife Tour Challenge in Charlottetown, P.E.I.

Since then, Homan has reeled off 27 consecutive victories against her fellow compatriot.

“We’ve just got to make sure that we keep getting better as the season goes on. That’s our focus,” said Homan, who now has three straight PointsBet Invitational titles to go along with being back-to-back wins at both the Scotties Tournament of Hearts and world women’s curling championship.

But there is no resting on past success with this team, who are laser-focused on the Canadian Olympic trials taking place Nov. 22-30 at Scotiabank Centre in Halifax.

“Right now, it’s not the time to celebrate, it’s time to keep working hard. Our goal is the end of November,” said Homan.

Canada’s top eight men’s and women’s teams will compete for the chance to represent Canada at the 2026 Olympic Winter Games in Italy.

“We’re working hard when we’re at home and even when we’re here at events, we’re trying to get better every game. That wasn’t our best performance, for sure, so we still have room to get better and to keep working hard,” said Homan.

On Aug. 25, two-time Canadian champ Heather Nedohin was named coach of the Homan team. While it’s only been six weeks, it’s been long enough for Nedohin to see that resolve first-hand.

“There’s no complacency. When they’re out practising, they’re refining every laser beam, every video review,” said Nedohin.

“The entire team is constantly trying to raise the bar within themselves, personally, whether it’s strength in the gym, whether it’s details of a video review from them personally on each shot, they’re extremely diligent at working at all aspects of the game and that’s why they continue to win.”

She says it makes her job easy when they’re so driven.

“You know the joke, I wish I had that inch?” said Nedohin. “We’re talking millimetres with our sport with runbacks or draws or precision placements.

“These girls are looking for that. They’re not looking for the inch, they’re looking for the millimetre.”

Despite Sunday’s loss, Brown was happy with the performance of her team from the Kamloops Curling Club made up of third Erin Pincott, second Sarah Koltun and lead Samantha Fisher.

At last weekend’s AMJ Masters grand slam event in London, Ont., in which Homan went 7-0 to win the Women’s tier 1, Brown’s crew went 0-4 in tier 2.

But her results this week took a sharp U-turn going a perfect 4-0 in the round robin before falling in the final.

“Obviously today’s game wasn’t what we would have liked, but I think we’re really happy with the steps we’ve made this week and really proved that we belong here,” said Brown.

Later Sunday, Winnipeg’s Matt Dunstone took down Calgary’s Brad Jacobs 6-4 in a wild men’s final.

It was Dunstone’s first-ever PointsBet Invitational crown after dropping finals in 2022 and 2023, both to Reid Carruthers in Fredericton and Oakville, Ont., respectively.

“We were due to win this one,” said Dunstone. “Lost two finals prior to it, so it was nice to finish one off.”